The Painful Truth Blog

Returning the Hearts of the Children to their Father.

What kind of father was HWA? Here are some excerpts from
“Herbert Armstrong’s Tangled Web” page 251-252.

7. I had said I had in my possession pictures of Mr. Armstrong in the nude having aberrant sexual relations with young boys.
While one becomes almost “shock proof” in the church
environment we have been in during recent years, this was the grossest charge of all. I have said no such thing. I have heard that such pictures exist and had heard so just recently in Pasadena from men who are still with the church. I don’t know how I would have come into possession of such pictures and told both Mr. Armstrong and Henry so. They both were very demanding to know who told me that. I would not say. Henry pushed and pushed on the matter. It is not a new story and always revolves around Sam Gotoh. Sherwin has told that one for years, but I have not heard it from him since Ted was kicked out. Henry, as I was leaving later on, pressed me again about the pictures as we stood outside the front door. Interestingly enough, neither Henry nor HWA denied that such pictures existed, nor did they deny any of the other charges (except the senility charge)!

Page 267:

None who have objectively heard the incest story in its awful
detail doubt it. This is a vital chapter left out of HWA’s
autobiography. This sin occurred over a long span of years, a
decade after his ordination to the ministry, according to his own family members. No wonder he was not receptive to David Antion’s “qualifications for the ministry” paper back in 1974.
Many of us have wondered why HWA was so forceful in
covering up Ted’s sins for so many years. Ted then seemed to be an extension of himself in his own mind and was not even a
separate entity. It was like covering for himself. But when finally he knew he must cut his son off, he had to go all the way. It was either destroy or be destroyed. And there were still some things he wanted to “get” out of life even if he were nearly ninety.
Such matters should not normally be mentioned, but this is by
no means a normal case. The welfare of thousands is at stake, and thousands who look to HWA, idolizing him as if he were God himself, must come to understand how dangerous such a view is.

From AR25 we read:

Since the mid-seventies there have been those at the church’s headquarters in Pasadena who have claimed that prior to her marriage to HWA, Ramona had conceived an illegitimate child by the church leader. (Marion McNair alluded to this in his 1977 book on Armstrongism.) One church employee has claimed to have seen the child’s birth certificate. And some have claimed that the child was born handicapped and put into an institution in Italy.

So with this in mind, how is it people still think that HWA was used by God? The truth is known but why do so many reject these facts? Why do they still sit at the feet of this pedophile/adulterer and his spiritual offspring who masquerade as beacons of righteousness?

It is because they reject their own bible and follow men who pretend to have the spirit of God within their own personality cult (church). The truth is,  they are nothing but opportunist that exploit the weak minds of those who remain within the chains of Armstrongism.

So I ask you. Who are the worthless servants? It is those who hear the word and reject it. For the traditions of men (religious personality cults) are whom you chase after, just like the biblical adulterer.

You deserve the beating coming to you!

My Point – and I do have one…

In the Monty Python “Argument” sketch, a man wants to take lessons in having an argument. But the instructor, rather than teaching the skills of constructing a rational argument, just says the opposite of whatever the man says. Some defenders of the COGs appear to believe the rationale of web-authors who disagree with anything COG-like is like that of the instructor.

When I see the Painful Truth and other COG-blogs labelled as anti-COG, I take some offense. In the COG universe, COG and anti-COG collision theoretically results in annihilation. As this does not happen in the real world, I have always preferred terms such as COG-critical or critique of purely unreasonable COG for sites that point out the anomalies, inconsistencies, and downright asinine antics of the WCG splinters.

Back in Spokesman’s Club, we endured harsh, even brutal, criticism of our speaking foibles. Tempered with the motto iron sharpens iron we were being “groomed” to add to the lay pool of men available to carry out minister-assigned duties. We were supposed to be thankful for correction, and use the admonishment to our betterment.

This has been my feeling about COG-critical posts – they provide feedback to the splinter leaders, who can use the observations to correct problems and clean up their act! Rather than dismissive attacks on these sites, splinter leaders should thank those who post articles for the service they provide free of charge, without cost or obligation!

Personally, I prefer to criticize trivial matters in more jocular jibes and tend to use more serious statements to chip away at the fundamentally flawed foundation on which Armstrongism is built.

Note to COG leaders – of course, not everything you read on critique sites contain useful suggestions for you to immediately apply to save your troubled ministry. Many posts are simply humorous observations, sometimes taken to the extreme. I’ll conclude with a story heard at Spokesman’s Club: the anecdote of a farmer and his mule. As the farmer was about to lead his mule to the field, he grabbed a club and whacked to mule on its head. To the horrified onlookers he explained, I did that to get his attention.

Hoss.

When you want to find the difference between COG Brand X and COG Brand Y, where do you go? Well, I almost always go to COGWriter, where one can find the major splinters and other selected organizations diligently compared to the same rigorous standards, “we in the LCG CCOG” and quotations from HWA – particularly, his 18 Restored Truths (or as an Australian friend said, “strewths”.

While one may find such comparisons as priority of spreading the word as opposed to caring for the flock down to birthdays, voting and what falling away means, there is no mention as to which covenant a group claims to be under. But, HWA claimed this (“Old” or “New” Covenant) to be “one of the most important doctrines” (Good News, Dec 18, 1978). Wouldn’t that be a worthy category for COG disection and classification?

Most non-COG churches would claim the “New Covenant”, started with the bread and wine of the Last Supper (which was most likely the fourth cup and bread of the Passover Seder, but that’s another story.) HWA uses the “marriage” analogy to show that Jesus’ death cancelled the “Old” Covenant with Israel (at Sinai, the plains of Moab, or both?) but leaves us to assume the covenants with Noah, Abraham, David, remained intact. HWA gives us a situation that the WCG was under the “conditions” of the “New” Covenant but it hasn’t actually started yet, or at least hasn’t formally started. From WCG doctrine, it seems the conditions of the pending New Covenant are a selective subset of the Old.

Of course, HWA did his usual fancy footwork to come to his conclusion. For starters, using Noah Webster to distinguish between “testament” and “covenant”, rather than explain term “testament” was adopted from Jerome’s Vulgate as a translation of “covenant”. And some COGs do a soft-shoe shuffle as well: making statements about being “under the New Covenant”, with no explanation at all given for their assertion.

GTA once remarked in a sermon he sees where there will be a new covenant with the “House of Israel” and the “House of Judah”, not with “The Church”. And of course there could be complications to explain a covenant with the “House of Israel” under the Anglo-Israel teaching that still permeates many COGs.

Back in Dr T’s LCG days, he said we are “truly under the New Covenant”. I once wrote to him to say, not looking for an argument but to state a fact, HWA never taught that. Perhaps that is why “covenant” is not used as a comparison between COGs, as LCG and CCOG have deviated from HWA’s teaching. It would nice to see a major splinter leader actually claim “HWA was wrong”.

Sick of your government intruding on your life like a WCG/PCG/LCG/ or any other ACOG minister, then sign up to join the lawsuit today.

"I'm looking for ten million Americans to stand with me and sue the federal government and TAKE BACK our rights.

Can I count on your help?

Without it, I truly fear where our fragile Republic could be headed . . .

Just in the past few days, you and I have learned Obama's NSA is looking through the phone records and emails of a billion Americans every day!

So yesterday morning, in an interview on Fox News, I announced I would be asking Internet providers and phone companies to join me in a class-action lawsuit to STOP this madness."

It doesn't matter what your politics are, it is about your personal freedom. Freedom from intrusive government in your life. If you don't agree then go join Flurries cult and enjoy. :-)

Blast from the past…

by Retired Prof

In his booklet Does God Exist and in numerous sermons Herbert W. Armstrong told us the universe is a much more precise timepiece than his expensive and accurate railroad watch. He said the cycles of days, months, and years repeat themselves with such exquisite precision that no fallible human mechanism such as that watch could possibly match them. In fact, he thundered in the concluding section of Does God Exist? (© 1957, 60, 70, 71):

Yes, [the watch] is corrected by the MASTER CLOCK OF THE UNIVERSE – up in the skies – by astronomers! Up there in the heavens is the great Master Clock that NEVER makes a mistake – is always ON TIME – never off a fraction of a second – the heavenly bodies coursing through the skies! (Available at Pabco’s Homepage Accessed 11 Feb. 2007.)

Since a human mind obviously designed the watch, Armstrong declared that some vastly superior mind must have designed the universe. A few lines farther down, he sneered at the very idea that the perfection he attributed to the cosmos could have arisen by chance instead of by divine creation, and he rudely told any skeptic who might believe so, “I do not respect your intelligence.”

Like Armstrong’s other “inspired revelations,” this claim was probably a rehash of someone else’s ideas—specifically, an argument made by Bishop William Paley in Natural Theology; Evidences of the Existence and Attributes of the Deity. Collected from the Appearances of Nature (1802). Paley too pointed out that if we found a watch in a field, we would conclude from the intricacy and precision of its design that someone made it; it could not possibly have arisen by random processes. Paley’s analogy, however, involved not the cosmic dimension but the biological. Since even the tiniest organisms are far more intricate than a watch, they too must have arisen from rational design and careful construction. Modern proponents of Intelligent Design (ID) theory depend heavily on this biological argument. (See, for example, Ross A. Taylor, The Creation Evolution Controversy .) Garner Ted Armstrong used a generalized design argument as Proof Number Five in “Seven Proofs God Exists,” Plain Truth Feb. 1960: 23.

As their main objection, ID opponents cite the idea that a person just has to believe it, or not, purely on faith. They say it is not a fit subject for scientific investigation because it cannot generate the prerequisite, a testable hypothesis. This charge is not true. Starting with some particular ID arguments, we can do what Albert Einstein called “thought experiments.” That is, make a prediction suggested by the theory and test it in the abstract by constructing a series of logical “what ifs.”

In fact, in Does God Exist? Armstrong challenged skeptics to perform just such an experiment. One of his boldface headings asked, “Suppose you Were Creator?” He elaborated:

Suppose that you could add to your powers of reasoning, planning, designing, the actual CREATIVE power, so that you could project your will anywhere to produce and bring into being whatever your mind should plan and desire. Then, suppose you undertook the designing, creating, fashioning, shaping, and setting in motion a limitless cosmic universe – with planets and suns and nebulae and galaxies in all their splendor, each of these vast units being of such intricate and complex construction as the existing universe.
. . . .
Do you think your mind would be equal to the task?

I accepted Armstrong’s challenge and thought about his question at some length. Of course my mind is not equal to the task of making light shine or bringing matter into being out of nothing or breathing life into that matter. However, I can meet part of the challenge. Follow me; let’s go through this together.

Assume our turn has come around to set the earth and nearby heavenly bodies in motion; remember, this is a thought experiment that doesn’t require us to physically create or twirl stars, planets, and moons. Want to bet you and I can think up a solar system that would point to an intelligent designer much more clearly than the one we’ve got now? Let’s try.

Another name for such a thought experiment is modeling, and it is one way scientists try to make sense out of the universe. They begin with a hypothesis about principles governing some phenomenon such as the weather or economic trends and use it as the basis for a picture or story—the model—showing how things ought to work. Then they hold up the model against reality to see if they match. If they do, the hypothesis is good; it approximates a truth. If they do not, the hypothesis needs to be revised, or perhaps rejected outright. To handle the massive sets of numbers needed for testing hypotheses about hurricanes or economic cycles, scientists have to resort to computer modeling, but Einstein worked out details in his thought experiments with a pencil and paper. Fortunately, the “universe as a perfect clock” idea can be modeled in this simple way.

Look at timekeeping principles. Any intelligently designed clock divides days into hours, hours into minutes, and minutes into seconds in whole numbers. No fractions. The clock that almost all human societies have settled on divides the day by 24, the hour and the minute each by 60, and the second (avoiding awkward fractions by switching to the decimal system) into tenths, hundredths, thousandths, and so forth. Though it would be smarter to keep the same divisor all the way through than to shift as we do between dozens and tens, the plan shows at least moderate good sense.

Let’s improve on it and extend it in the other direction: toward weeks, months, and years. First task is to eliminate the numerical shifts and pick a consistent number for a base. The dozen is a good one, and (at least partway through the system) our clock already uses it. Two dozen hours from sunset to sunset, five dozen minutes in an hour, and five dozen seconds in a minute. Furthermore, this system can connect with the dozens we use in the calendar: 12 months in the year, 12 signs in the zodiac.

You might well ask, “Why not design a decimal clock? The decimal system, base 10, gives us a regular set of multiples that make calculations easy.” That’s perfectly true, if we’re talking multiples of ten. Going the other way, to fractions of ten, it’s wrong. Half works out fine, because 5 is a whole number. But divide 10 into thirds and quarters, and you get fractions: 3 1/3 and 2 ½. Actually, human beings just fell into base 10 through a sort of accident: that’s how many fingers we count on. To build an intelligent design from scratch, we want something smarter than a mere ad hoc choice. The duodecimal system, based on the dozen, qualifies because 12 multiplies as easily as 10 and divides much more neatly: half is 6, a third is 4, a quarter is 3, and a sixth is 2—all whole numbers.

So to design a cosmic clock intelligently, we should place the sun and moon in the sky and set the earth spinning at just the right rate to make the month last a multiple of 12 days and make the month fit exactly 12 times into the year. Let’s see, the moon has four phases (the basis for weeks). I suggest we make it simple: let the moon orbit the earth in 48 days, so that each phase, each week if you will, lasts a dozen days. If we then adjust the clock to give 12 orbits of the moon in the time it takes for the earth to orbit the sun once, we’ve got our 12-month year, which amounts to four dozen weeks, or 48 dozen (4 x 12 x 12) days. Spring, summer, fall, and winter—each season is 12 dozen days long. That’s an even gross. And of course, as careful clockmakers we’ll adjust the orbits so that each unit fits into the next larger unit precisely, to the millisecond (or whatever the duodecimal equivalent is called.) We’ll make the system constant, so it never slows down or speeds up.

Any rational being contemplating such a clock would have no doubt whatsoever. This outfit was put together by an intelligent designer. A person would also know it was given as a sign; the designer intended for creatures to recognize and acknowledge their creator.

All right, I have to admit that my suggestion to base the clock on nested series of dozens is arbitrary—it’s a good choice, but not an inevitable one. So, how else could some omnipotent omniscience certify to us rational beings that it was responsible? Well, supernatural claims require supernatural evidence. Any system that so clearly violated laws of probability that no creature could possibly mistake it for a natural phenomenon would do. It would need to be astonishingly regular—though not necessarily perfectly so. Perhaps a creator would be wise to let the system slip slightly out of sync from time to time. The miracles required to readjust it would remind us periodically who was in charge.

As we know from our own counting system, the decimal system actually works out quite well and would do nicely. Another way an intelligent designer could eliminate randomness is by choosing a series of prime numbers, as the aliens did in Carl Sagan’s Contact. The point is, any creator bent on constructing a clocklike universe to proclaim to rational creatures, “I AM WHAT I AM!” would need to provide signs that could never be misinterpreted as a result of random chance.

You already know that the real cosmic clock does not match our hypothetical base-12 model, but let’s check the details. Keep alert, though; remember that other nonrandom systems might exist.

I found the ratios of our actual “clock” in Eric Weisstein’s World of Astronomy ( accessed 13 Feb. 2007), though many other encyclopedic references would work just as well. Start with the day: in a month there are slightly more than 29.53 of them, meaning that each lunar phase (the basis for our week) lasts about 7.3825 days. The number of days in the year amounts to 365.2425. That means there are, on average, 12.3685 months in the year, or something very close to 49.5 lunar phases. Just look at that: every ratio is fractional; not one thing divides evenly into anything else. No formula connects the units in any regular mathematical series.

Intelligent? Nah. Random. Therefore dumb.

If our cosmic clock really was designed that way intentionally, the designer must have intended to mimic blind chance. What’s the point of that? Any human clockmaker who built such a mechanism would be considered at best a practical joker and at worst a victim of dementia.

It gets worse. In his definition of lunation, Weisstein reveals that cycles don’t repeat themselves with such exquisite precision as Armstrong maintained: “[A]s a result of torques from the Sun, the actual time interval between consecutive new moons varies greatly. Meeus (1988) gives a table of the shortest (29 days 06 hours 35 minutes) and longest (29 days 19 hours 55 minutes) lunations from 1900 to 2100.” What intelligently designed clock marks time with units that stretch and shrink?

Even worse: remember in the first quotation above, where Armstrong said the universal clock “is always ON TIME – never off a fraction of a second”? Not so. The clock is gradually slowing down. The earth, being slightly out of round, is putting gravitational torque on the moon’s orbit, causing the moon to slow in its orbit and gradually drift away, so that the month is getting slightly longer all the time. So is the day. Friction from the tides impedes the earth’s rotation enough to require the addition of a leap second every 450 to 500 days.

Now if we felt generous, we might concede that months of varying lengths are a lot like the lengthening days and shortening nights as spring approaches (to be balanced out as fall comes on). Engineers shake their heads in despair at this irregularity, but some of us artistic types might even feel that it enriches the clock, spices it up with a sort of mischievous whimsy. Besides, if lunations can be predicted through the year 2100, they’re at least not random.

The slowing down is different. Those leap seconds have to be allocated ad hoc, based on measurements of how much the earth’s rotation has actually slowed. It varies. Any clock that drifts inexorably but unpredictably farther and farther out of adjustment is a bad clock, and whimsy be damned.

The flaws don’t prove there was no creator, of course. On the other hand, in no way do they provide us a sign there was one.

Armstrong preached that unity pervades the cosmos; every part participates in the design of the whole. If that is so, then the demonstrable randomness in the cosmic clock implies that, possibly, our human existence in the universe is also random. The hypothetical creator could easily have cleared up the ambiguity by building a miraculously regular clock. As I mentioned before, any numerical basis would work, as long as the clock was regular and consistent, but any omnipotent designer that did use base 12 could have given us six fingers on each hand. By counting on our fingers, we would naturally have adopted the convenient base-12 system of arithmetic, the same one governing the clock.

If the cogs and ratchets in such a cosmic clock really did produce no random ratios among our days, lunar phases, months, and years, and if the timing really were reliably precise, the evidence would be incontrovertible. We would, as Herbert W. Armstrong liked to shout, “TRULY KNOW!” Then, seeing that our bodies and minds obviously participated in the same consistent and easy-to-factor system of dozens that ruled the cosmos, we would stand in awe of the thematic unity of it all. We could rest easy, secure in the knowledge that we got here by design and not by accident.

We would then have a way to put apparent catastrophes into perspective. For example, during the great Sumatra-Andaman earthquake of 26 December 2004, displacement of mass in the earth’s crust altered the length of the day by a few milliseconds. If the universe really were a (mostly) perfect clock, we would realize that the suffering of all those human beings drowned or rendered homeless by the ensuing tsunami, though regrettable, was necessary to preserve the grand design. We could have perfect faith that the clock needed a tiny miraculous adjustment to bring everything back into perfect synchrony, and we could appreciate the wisdom of the appalling carnage.

As things stand now, we are left in doubt. Deep and abiding doubt.

What was HWA’s biggest whopper?

Seeing the remark by Reichsleiter Goebbels, and remembering the line on lies from Mein Kampf, I wondered, What was HWA’s biggest whopper?
He did like to repeat things – The Two Trees, Give and Get, 1900 years, his unique “training”; disregarding any doctrinal concoction, what about himself personally – something repeated, something said for a reason, something of which the truth was known only to himself, or to very few.

What about “Loma’s dream”? On its own, not really significant. That he was revealed the truth “by no man”? We know how HWA understood “revealed” –  as John Kiesz observed, it can mean reading an article in the Bible Advocate, checking the proof texts, and he was “revealed” some new truth. Perhaps “I was never a member of the Church of God, Stanberry, MO or Salem, WV” – he could have a esoteric definition of “member”. “I never tried to steal members from other churches” – some methods of siphoning off members may not be considered “stealing”. There was the car steering wheel incident, the story of his son Richard’s death, and many other tales vary in significance and veracity. I’d first like to consider something earlier – HWA the business tycoon.

An article in the Ambassador Report, Herbert Armstrong – Man on the Move, summarizes HWA’s accommodation situation during his affluent years. Where did all his supposed wealth go? It certainly wasn’t put into personal real estate, nor into good investments, as he was wiped out even before the crash of ’29. Why would he want to exaggerate his success? The same reason as his business failures – it is part of the “proof” he was called. In later years, the “early success” story was repeated, with alleged income always given as the current equivalent value.

Another repeated story is Loma’s bible study with Ora Runcorn that proved the Sabbath, and HWA’s challenge to refute it. It is possible that the “Sabbath challenge” may have been fabricated, but I’ve only read anecdotal evidence for this. From some WCG accounts (of the Tkatch Jr era) HWA went searching for religion, and encountered Andrew Dugger, a few years earlier than Loma’s bible study. Bill Dankenbring wrote that HWA was inspired to turn to religion (as a source of income) when he met a Seventh-Day Adventist minister who lived in a fine home paid for by his congregation’s tithes. It was also stated that HWA turned to writing and selling religious tracts. If these accounts are in any way true, it makes more sense that HWA needed a good cover story for his transition from failed ad man to religious con man.

The Sabbath challenge adds a nice touch  – even HWA’s critics mention it without question. And it is not unique in WCG history, appearing from time to time along the path from William Miller, a non-Sabbatarian adventist, up to COG-Seventh Day.

And I certainly wouldn’t deny the time spent in the Portland Public Library – others have documented that the library’s card catalog showed a good selection of resource material that could have “revealed” a lot of “truth”. And as for HWA’s unique training – yes, I doubt if any other church leader on earth received his training at Portland Public Library.

Is a religious sociopath present in your church leadership? Well is there?

Those who use mind control on others often have a deep inferiority complex.  What they require is attention and power. They learn to crave it, and develop a need for more and more power. They operate under the belief that people are too stupid and UN-spiritual to know what is best for them. Eventually they begin to believe their own propaganda.

Defend your psyche. Do not allow someone without a conscience convince you that humanity is a failure. Normal human beings do possess conscience. Normal human beings are able to love. Normal human beings do not make wild claims.

The best way to protect yourself from a sociopath is to avoid him, to refuse any kind of contact or communication. The only truly effective method for dealing with a sociopath you have identified is to disallow him or her from you life altogether. Sociopaths live completely outside of the social contract, and therefore to include them in relationships or other social arrangements is perilous. 

Click for better view.

… My work is a good example of the strict isolation of the particular contribution which psycho-analytic discussion can make to the solution of the problem of religion. … It is, of course, my duty to point out the connecting links …, between the deeper and the manifest motives, between the father-complex and man’s helplessness and need for protection.

These connections are not hard to find. They consist in the relation of the child’s helplessness to the helplessness of the adult which continues it. So that, as was to be expected, the motives for the formation of the religion which psycho-analysis revealed now turn out to be the same as the infantile contribution to the manifest motives. Let us transport ourselves in the mental life of a child. You remember the choice of object according to the anaclitic [attachment] type, which psycho-analysis talks of? The libido there follows the paths of narcissistic needs and attaches itself to the objects which ensure the satisfaction of those needs. In this way the mother, who satisfies the child hunger, becomes its first love-object and certainly also its first protection against all the undefined dangers which threaten it in the external world — its first protection against anxiety, we may say.

In this function [of protection] the mother is soon replaced by the stronger father, who retains that position for the rest of childhood. But the child’s attitude to its father is coloured by a peculiar ambivalence. The father himself constitutes a danger for the child, perhaps because of its earlier relation to its mother. Thus it fears him no less than it longs for him and admires him. The indications of this ambivalence in the attitude to the father are deeply imprinted in every religion, as was shown in Totem and Taboo. When the growing individual finds that he is destined to remain a child for ever, that he can never do without protection against strange powers, he lends those powers the features belonging to the figure of his father; he creates for himself the gods whom he dreads, whom he seeks to propitiate, and whom he nevertheless entrusts with his own protection. Thus his longing for a father is a motive identical with his need for protection against the consequences of his human weakness. The defense against childish helplessness is what lends its characteristic features to the adult’s reaction to the helplessness which he has to acknowledge — a reaction which is precisely the formation of religion. But it is not my intention to enquire any further into the development of the idea of God; what we are concerned with here is the finished body of religious ideas as it is transmitted by civilization to the individual.

The Devil and Dave Pack!

2 Timothy 3: (Evil People)

New International Version

…People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy,  without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good,  treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God—  having a form of godliness but denying its power. Have nothing to do with such people.

From AR 54

Letter to Roderick Meredith from one ex-WCG member who attempted to fellowship with GCG:

Dear Mr. Meredith:

I was recently disfellowshipped from the Global Church of God by area minister Dave Pack because I found it necessary, once more, to stand up for the Truth.

On August 6, 1993, 1 was awakened at 10:30 p.m. by a telephone call from Mr. Pack. I was questioned about my interest in Mr. William F. Dankenbring’s articles about Passover and Pentecost. In my studies of this comprehensive literature, I have proven to myself, from the Bible, that the dates and manner in which we keep these Holy Days are in error. I was sharing my new understanding of these Truths with the Host of the Tuckerton, New Jersey congregation. This is what prompted the call from Mr. Pack.

In our conversation, Mr. Pack made the statement, “Mr. Dankenbring makes his living acquiring information on sins about people and paying people to publish books about them. Aren’t you glad, John, that he doesn’t know your sins or he would publish a book about you?” Why is it that when we can’t attack the message, we attack the messenger? When will this stop?
Mr. Pack was also very hostile toward Mr. John Trechak, saying he has been spreading garbage about him for years. And “that Trechak is no good.” In one of your early sermon tapes you admonished us not to say unkind things about people, even when we ourselves are attacked. Is there a double standard in the Church? Where is Mr. Pack’s humble attitude that ministers and members alike are supposed to exhibit?

---

 From AR 32

Armstrong Follower Held In Murder of Daughter

On Sept. 20, 1984, Armstrong follower Lois Marie Elliott of North Tonawanda, New York was charged with second- degree murder. Police say that before dawn that day, the 36-year-old woman stabbed her four-year-old daughter to death in the child’s bed, knifed herself in the chest, in an apparent suicide attempt, and then telephoned police, saying, “I killed her.” Officers dispatched to the scene discovered the pajama-clad body of the little girl, Roxanne Elizabeth, in her own bed. She had already died from multiple stab wounds, mostly to the chest. Mrs. Elliott was found nearby bleeding from a wound to her own chest. (The Buffalo News, Sept. 20, 1984, p. 1 and Sept. 21, p. C- 5.)

Elliott was divorced from her WCG-member husband Frederick R. Elliott of Kenmore, New York, and had been living with her widowed mother Olive Baldassara. Mrs. Baldassara was home the night of the tragedy, but was apparently asleep in another room during the attack.

Investigators say that Elliott had telephoned police the previous evening claiming her ex-husband had sexually abused their daughter. But police have since concluded that there are “no facts to support that allegation.” After Elliott was treated at a hospital and released into police custody, she told investigators she had “committed a sin that would carry on through her bloodline” and that her daughter had “committed an unpardonable sin and didn’t pray enough.”

Neighbors described Elliott as a reclusive “religious fanatic” who rarely allowed her daughter outdoors to play. Church acquaintances told us that although Elliott had been disfellowshipped from the WCG, she had remained faithful to church teachings and had desired to be reinstated in the church. Reinstatement was not forthcoming, however, because she had been labeled as having a “demon problem.”

One of Elliott’s church friends said, “I don’t think Pack [Dave Pack, a WCG minister in the Buffalo, New York area] ever encouraged her to get psychiatric help. And if he really thought she had demons, why didn’t he just cast them out, like in the Bible?”

Another acquaintance said, “We could sense Lois had a problem, but her church experience and her marriage problems didn’t help her. Then after she was disfellowshipped she seemed to get worse. She really needed help.”

Niagara County First Assistant District Attorney Stephen P. Shierling told the Report he fully intends to prosecute Elliott on the murder charge. But Elliott’s attorney, James Perry of North Tonawanda told us that his client has been declared mentally incompetent to assist in her own defense, has been committed to a state mental hospital for treatment, and that there is no way to know if she will ever recover sufficiently to be able to stand trial.

Whatever the legal outcome, the fact remains that a pretty little four-year-old girl is dead. Neighbors told reporters how Roxanne’s father had visited the little girl at least twice each week and how happy she always seemed to be when he arrived. The Buffalo News story of Sept. 21 had this ending:

Although neighbors Thursday said that they never saw the little girl playing outside, her father, Mr. Elliott, talked about her energy and her precociousness. She loved to dance and draw and could name all the states, he said.

“She had a mind like you wouldn’t believe,” he told The News. “She was like a little adult, a little Shirley Temple. She was so vivacious.” Mr. Elliott then politely declined any further comment, and broke down in tears.

David Pack’s Reign of Terror

On the night of Roxanne Elliott’s death, one of the last people – probably the very last one – Lois Elliott phoned before the tragedy was WCG minister David Pack, pastor of the Buffalo (North), New York congregation.. Exactly what was said, we don’t know. At least not yet. That information may well come out should Lois Elliott ever recover sufficiently to stand trial. What is remarkable, however, is how often Pack’s name seems to appear in conjunction with tragedies in the WCG. For a number of years now, no WCG minister’s name has appeared more often in letters written to the Report complaining of ministerial abuse.

Pack, a burly 6-foot, 5-inch Ambassador College graduate known locally for his authoritarian style, has so incensed some in his flock that a group have circulated an open letter detailing his abuses and have called for his removal. The letter describes Pack’s ministerial leadership as a “Reign of Terror.” On the cover page, addressed to WCG headquarters leaders, they wrote: “David’s power-crazed quest to totally dominate the mind, body, and spirit of church members has not been done in a corner and has been done clearly in view of all to see at headquarters in Pasadena.”

On the following 13 pages of their letter the allegations about Pack read like a horror story. The authors contend that Pack constantly intimidates members, uses threats and mind-control methods, is given to extreme emotional outbursts, is highly political, believes in winning at all cost, has disfellowshipped members for trivial faults, prescribes diets while “playing M.D.,” insists on being addressed as Mr. Pack, enjoys wearing skimpy, skin-tight shorts to sporting events, has actually worn a wolf costume to church socials, enjoys putting down women, and told one married woman with children, “It would be better for you to shack up one night with a man than wear makeup.”

The letter quotes Pack as having said, “Everyone who has challenged me has either died, been seriously injured or has been eliminated from the work.” And, “God backs me even if I am wrong.”

On page 7 the authors made this statement to Pack (emphasis ours):

Doesn’t it bother you that while you were in charge of the Rochester and Syracuse area there were three suicides? One can only wonder why they chose to kill themselves while you were their main advisor in the area. Perhaps you suggested to one or more of them that they would in no way make it into the Kingdom of God…. A statement such as, “You are no longer in the body of Christ,” could have caused one to give up and kill himself.

The above quote was written well before the Elliott family tragedy. Some who knew little Roxanne and her mother Lois Elliott wonder if it might have been a prophecy.

Inside the Mind of a Sociopath

Can you spot your cult leader in all of this?

• Lack of empathy

• No remorse

• Flat out lies to people

• Lie and cheat to be the top dog

• Manipulation

• Abusive

• Callous indifference

• Does not know right from wrong

Are Millennials More Narcissistic?

What’s causing this uptick in narcissistic behavior? Watch!

2 Timothy 3:1-9 (Truly Evil People)

New International Version (NIV)

…People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful (Dave Pack, Rod Meredith, Bob Thiel, Ron Weinland etc), proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, 3 without love,(Read the HORROR STORIES) unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, 4 treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God— 5 having a form of godliness but denying its power. (Everything that the Acog’s are) Have nothing to do with such people.

6 They are the kind who worm their way into homes and gain control over gullible women, who are loaded down with sins and are swayed by all kinds of evil desires, 7 always learning but never able to come to a knowledge of the truth. 8 Just as Jannes and Jambres opposed Moses, so also these teachers oppose the truth. They are men of depraved minds, who, as far as the faith is concerned, are rejected. 9 But they will not get very far because, as in the case of those men, their folly will be clear to everyone. Clear to everyone but those who follow these so called leaders. It is the cult of personality that these people within the Acog’s follow. When they are not worshiping HWA’s memory, they are groveling before their cult leader seeking to please him. 

To the tune of As Someday it May Happen (I’ve Got a Little List) from The Mikado, Gilbert and Sullivan.

As someday it will happen that some changes must be made,
Just make a little list, you need a little list,
Of unimportant doctrines to rest that can be laid,
And they never need be missed, deny that they exist!

And there’re doctrinal anomalies
That New Truth can correct,
Forgotten dogma you can seize
And put in full effect.

There’s the ever-changing makeup rule
When duplicity’s your game,
And if one day you must retool
Have someone else to blame!

And there are rules like tithing
That you must never touch,
(Just have a special offering
When you want such-and-such.)

But it really doesn’t matter
What you put upon your list,
As long as you persist,
The longer you’ll exist!

Whatever’s on your list
As long you persist
The longer you’ll exist!

How often they must cut their hair
How short a skirt can be
How long to make a closing prayer,
With one statement, two, or three.

If it is “Mister” to a Pastor
Even if he’s half their age;
If giving help in a disaster
Is a misuse of their wage.

Where you want to hold the Feast
And who can give a sermon;
Who to say will be The Beast
(As long as he’s a German.)

So it really doesn’t matter
What’s on or off your list,
As long as you insist
That they obey the list!

As long as you insist
And chastise those who resist
They will obey the list!

Philosopher Daniel Dennett writes in a book titled Religion As A Natural Phenomenon, a tiny parasite called the Lancet Fluke has captured the brain of an ant, and forced it to climb the tallest blade of grass. The ant gains  nothing from this, but the Fluke profits by using the ant to get itself into the stomach of a sheep or cow to reproduce itself. The cow eats the grass, and the Fluke produces another generation.  Of course the ant has no reproductive machinery, and perhaps that is the reason the Fluke can use it so easily. Perhaps there is a kind of “ecstasy of the cells” in the ant when they discover they have a driven purpose of reproduction, even if not their own. Other parasites infect fish and mice for similar reasons. Dennett writes:

Pack-a-messiah

May 19 2013 will be the 40th Pentecost Sunday, as opposed to Monday, for those of the WCG persuasion – counting from 1974, inclusive.

Living in a virtual Ponderosa, I tend to do a lot of pondering. Some of the time, it’s about how a young steer is like a COG – you have to keep feeding it, and all you get for your effort is what comes out the other end. Other times it’s the ponderous polemics of Pastor-General Pack.

Recently, ponderings have been Passover to Pentecost, covenants, and how those of the remnant COGs seem to understand the Temple system, sacrifices, and the Levites. I don’t remember the theme of WCG Pentecost sermons – “theme” as the Day of Atonement sermon was always about Satan – but it was probably Firstfruits, and the beginning of “The Church”. There’s a problem with Firstfruits too, as the Day of Firstfruits is day from which the days are counted; Pentecost, or Shavuot, is a second harvest, or a second Firstfruits…

When a sermon references Acts 2, with Peter explaining he’s not drunk, ministers like to make little remarks like, it’s 9 AM, the pubs aren’t open yet. I never heard a minister explain that Peter meant it was Shacharis – morning prayers and the commencement of sacrifices at the 3rd hour. Peter and the other followers were in the Temple for Shavuot. To Jews, the “tongues” spoken on Pentecost would make them think of Sinai: by tradition, the Law was given on the first Shavuot, and it was spoken in “70 languages”.

In Acts 3, Peter and John are still going to the Temple. By the time we get to the writing of Hebrews, over 30 years have passed. Of course, WCG teaching uses Hebrews to justify tithing – the Temple and the Levitical priesthood are out, Melchizedek and the Church are in. Even biblical translators had an unwitting hand in this, playing with some of the verb tenses, which can make on-going actions appear as past – and as much as COG scholars like to refer to Greek words, I’ve never seen an attempt to correct the tense problem.

There is much more to this, but I was sidetracked by the latest instalment of the weekly RCG update. Episode 12, Haggai part 1 left me flabbergasted, and I’ve got enough flab of my own. From what it is hinting at, the Apostle Pastor-General may be about to claim he is the prophesied Joshua who is to come after Zerubbabel (assumed to have been HWA). Along a connected plot line, my suspicions are that he will say the RCG is the House of God – though more likely spiritual than physical. I’ll be waiting for the next instalment, same Pack time, same Pack channel. And I suppose it’s no surprise that the name Joshua (Yeshua in Hebrew) is derived from the verb meaning salvation, and in Greek is rendered as Jesus.

Once again, I will agree with a Pack prediction: splinter leaders will tell their sheep the prophecies cited in the instalment mean something different.

And as we are dealing with prophecy, Haggai part 1 contained an insult by omission of the good Dr T: “Recent, newer, self-appointed ‘prophets’ … on the lunatic fringe…”; “Large – Gerald Flurry. Medium – Ron Weinland. Small – not worth naming.”

Hoss.

Click to Enlarge

Mankind’s Worse Enemy!
Those we put our hope and trust in. Those whom we call authority.

Authoritarian Abuse.

The following are general signs and symptoms/common characteristics of authoritarianism.

1. No accountability.

2. Paranoia and insecurity by the leaders, which can evolve into total and unquestioned obedience to the leadership or outright rebellion.

3. Self-aggrandizement by the leaders.

4. Public “image”  is of the utmost importance. Image over substance.

5. Theological/political incompetence/ from the leadership. Hermeneutics/Bible/constitutional exegesis/ not employed in the formulation of doctrine/law. Twisting and bastardization of Scripture/constitutional law/ to provide proof-texts for unorthodox/invented doctrines/legal interpretations.

6. Constant prophetic/Constitutional/ missteps.

7. Devaluation of the members/citizens.

8. Incidences of financial, marital, moral, and psychological instability within the ministry/political body.
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 Biblical Blasphemy by Thomas Paine

The Church tells us that the books of the Old and New Testament are divine revelation, and without this revelation we could not have true ideas of God.

The Deist, on the contrary, says that those books are not divine revelation; and that were it not for the light of reason and the religion of Deism, those books, instead of teaching us true ideas of God, would teach us not only false but blasphemous ideas of Him.

Deism teaches us that God is a God of truth and justice. Does the Bible teach the same doctrine? It does not.

The Bible says (Jeremiah 20, 7) that God is a deceiver. “O Lord (says Jeremiah) thou hast deceived me, and I was deceived. Thou art stronger than I, and hast prevailed.”

Jeremiah not only upbraids God with deceiving him, but, in 4, 10, he upbraids God with deceiving the people of Jerusalem. “Ah! Lord God (says he), surely thou hast greatly deceived this people and Jerusalem, saying, ye shall have peace, whereas the sword reacheth unto the soul.”

In 15, 18, the Bible becomes more impudent, and calls God in plain language, a liar. “Wilt thou (says Jeremiah to God) be altogether unto me as a liar and as waters that fail?”

Ezekiel 14, 9, makes God to say – “If the prophet be deceived when he hath spoken a thing, I the Lord have deceived that prophet.” All this is downright blasphemy.

The prophet Micaiah, as he is called, II Chron. 18, 18-21, tells another blasphemous story of God. “I saw,” says he, “the Lord sitting on His throne, and all the hosts of Heaven standing on His right hand and on His left. And the Lord said, who shall entice Ahab, King of Israel, to go up and fall at Ramoth Gilead? And one spoke after this manner, and another after that manner.

“Then there came out a spirit [Micaiah does not tell us where he came from] and stood before the Lord [what an impudent fellow this spirit was] and said, I will entice him. And the Lord said unto him, wherewith? And he said, I will go out and be a lying spirit in the mouth of all his prophets. And the Lord said, Thou shalt entice him, and thou shalt also prevail; go out, and do even so.”

We often hear of a gang of thieves plotting to rob and murder a man, and laying a plan to entice him out that they may execute their design, and we always feel shocked at the wickedness of such wretches; but what must we think of a book that describes the Almighty acting in the same manner, and laying plans in heaven to entrap and ruin mankind? Our ideas of His justice and goodness forbid us to believe such stories, and therefore we say that a lying spirit has been in the mouth of the writers of the books of the Bible.

-Thomas Paine

Of the Origin and Design of Government in General.

Truncated essay ~

SOME writers have so confounded society with government, as to leave little or no distinction between them; whereas they are not only different, but have different origins. Society is produced by our wants, and government by our wickedness; the former promotes our happiness POSITIVELY by uniting our affections, the latter NEGATIVELY by restraining our vices. The one encourages intercourse, the other creates distinctions. The first is a patron, the last a punisher.

Society in every state is a blessing, but Government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state an intolerable one: for when we suffer, or are exposed to the same miseries BY A GOVERNMENT, which we might expect in a country WITHOUT GOVERNMENT, our calamity is heightened by reflecting that we furnish the means by which we suffer. Government, like dress, is the badge of lost innocence; the palaces of kings are built upon the ruins of the bowers of paradise. For were the impulses of conscience clear, uniform and irresistibly obeyed, man would need no other lawgiver; but that not being the case, he finds it necessary to surrender up a part of his property to furnish means for the protection of the rest; and this he is induced to do by the same prudence which in every other case advises him, out of two evils to choose the least. Wherefore, security being the true design and end of government, it unanswerably follows that whatever form thereof appears most likely to ensure it to us, with the least expense and greatest benefit, is preferable to all others.

-Thomas Paine

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The Parasites Among Us

In this era of American oppression, our rights granted by the Constitution and the Magna Carta (800 years ago) are being trampled on and eliminated one by one. Free speech is going away. Don’t believe it?

A 16-year-old high school student’s video report for his American Government class earned him an A+ from his teacher. It also yielded a visit from the FBI.

Justin Hallman says that a project he put together for school that included information on the National Defense Authorization Act, Rep. Ron Paul, Anonymous and the Occupy Wall Street movement was well received in the classroom, but wasn’t exactly praised by others. After agents with the Federal Bureau of Investigation saw a copy of Hallman’s finished work on YouTube, they paid a visit to his own home.

“Hallman says the meeting wasn’t an informal chat, either, but even involved a proposition. According to the high-schooler, the FBIs attempted to recruit Hallman as an undercover source to scoop up more information on Anonymous and Occupy Wall Street.”

So they wanted the kid to risk his life and become a “snitch”

For when they speak great swelling words of emptiness, they allure through the lusts of the flesh, through lewdness, the ones who have actually escaped from those who live in error. ¹⁹ While they promise them liberty, they themselves are slaves of corruption; for by whom a person is overcome, by him also he is brought into bondage. 2 Peter 2:18-19

According to Forbes Magazine,

The top ten jobs that psychopaths can be found in:

• 1. CEO
  2. Lawyer
  3. Media (Television/Radio)
  4. Salesperson
  5. Surgeon
  6. Journalist
  7. Police officer
  8. Clergy person
  9. Chef
  10. Civil servant

Least likely professions for psychopaths:

• 1. Care aide
  2. Nurse
  3. Therapist
  4. Craftsperson
  5. Beautician/Stylist
  6. Charity worker
  7. Teacher
  8. Creative artist
  9. Doctor
  10. Accountant

Note that these ten above, from “Care aide to Accountant”  these people have mostly a altruistic type of employment, or selflessness as their principle or practice concerning the welfare of others.

An article by Dr. Robert Schug and Dr. Jill Ricke a licensed Psychologist in private practice in Florida states:

The careers that psychopathic individuals choose are often a reflection of their need for power, money, and sex.  This can be characterized by a person needing to be “the most powerful”, the “most admired or revered” or to be the “most important.”  Some of these career choices include the field of law enforcement, the field of medicine, the legal field, and the pastoral or ministry field.

You can listen to the podcast and read more here.

Psychopaths and individuals with psychopathic traits are drawn to the religious profession for several reasons:

• Power

• Notoriety

• Money

• Access to vulnerable individuals.

Does this fit any minister or politician you may know or have known?
So why do you still put your trust in men who pillage your finances and place you into bondage? Politician or priest, their both out to screw you!